Archive for the ‘Updates’ Category

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1.1.4 stock to customized - howto notes

Saturday, March 1st, 2008

Starting point is a stock 1.1.4 iPhone, as installed by iTunes doing a full system restore.

1. Back up (sync) your data.  Don’t forget the pictures.

2. Upgrade to 1.1.4 using iTunes if you haven’t already.

3. go to the ziphone site, Zibri’s site, here: http://www.ziphone.org/

4. Download, unzip, and install the ziphone app.

5. You’ve got some choices here.  I’m going with just jailbreak but, let’s talk about terminology for a minute here.

“Unlock” means, set your iPhone to be able to use a carrier other than it sold with (AT&T in the US).

“Jailbreak” or “Unjail” means, open up the system so installer.app can be installed, you can ssh into it, etc.

I’m going with just “jailbreak”.  I don’t need to switch carriers, or run without one.  So, “Jailbreak”

6. Wait patiently.  Your iPhone will reboot a few times, and in the length of time it took me to type this, it’s done.  My screen now has two new buttons, “Zibri’s blog”, and the familiar Installer.app icon.

7. Before you go nuts installing things in installer, get some of the likely prerequisites installed first:

- Update installer itself (it will prompt you for this)

- BSD subsystem (under “System” category)

- Community Sources (under “Sources” category)

8.  That’s it.  You’re set.  Far as I can tell, all the features work; I had heard reports of things like google maps auto-locate feature not working on a 1.1.3 iPhone that had this run on it, but, it seems to be working fine for me.  If you have any problems, I’d love to hear about it, register and reply to the post.

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Posted in Updates, iPhone Updates, iPhone hacks, zibri | 3 Comments »

1.1.3 jailbreak apparently accomplished, details to follow

Sunday, January 20th, 2008

I’m seeing reports that 1.1.3 has been jailbroken, but that it apparently involves some hardware. Trying to get details now.

In the meantime, DON’T UPGRADE TO 1.1.3 UNLESS YOU WANT TO GET STUCK THERE. The jiggling icons & google maps pseudo-GPS are cool but, they’re not that cool.

So here’s the deal.  The motivated geniuses on the iPhone Dev Team have got the method, and have posted a couple of videos to youtube showing the results.  But, here’s where the cat-n-mouse game comes into it.  They’re not going to release the method until after Apple releases the SDK.   Makes sense if you think about it - the SDK may come with yet another upgrade, or maybe not.  But, it would be bad to have to choose between jailbroken and the SDK apps.  By waiting until the SDK has been relased, then we have a sweet spot where we’ve got that and all of our third-party apps.

The annoying thing is, that this is so completely unnecessary.  Wouldn’t it be so much easier if Apple would just give us OpenSSH and terminal.app with the new upgrades.  The cat & mouse game goes on, they break our unlock for a day or week or two, and then we’re back to playing our games on the new firmware.  It’s not going to end, there are more smart motivated people trying to unlock it than there are trying to keep it locked.  I hope Apple isn’t wasting a lot of effort on this, which could be better spent improving the iPhone/iPod Touch with, oh, I don’t know, maybe Flash viewer or something?

Posted in Updates, iPhone hacks, iPod Touch hacks | 1 Comment »

1.1.3 is here. Upgrade & downgrade notes

Wednesday, January 16th, 2008

It’s here, in all it’s un-glory. OK, the google maps auto-locate thing works well, centered the bullseye on the building I’m in. Pretty impressive, glad to see it works. The moving icons around thing, well, we’ve had for a few months. Implemented well though as one would expect from Apple. Being able to put bookmarks on the main page is nice, but it doesn’t use the favicon as the source for the button, which seems to me to be a blisteringly obvious oversight. Ah well, we’ll see in 1.1.4. Dramatically missing continues to be Flash Player.

So the “upgrade” to 1.1.3 is simple and painless, as expected. Let’s talk about getting back to hacked. I have a bet for a lunch with a coworker (I’m informed it’s for the sushi place) so I have some motivation here.

Update:  I know a lot of ways to not do it so far.  Got a couple more things to try but, worst case, I’ll post a list of what _doesn’t_ work.

Posted in Updates, iPhone hacks | No Comments »

Heads up: new upgrade may be coming. Wait before applying it.

Monday, December 31st, 2007

Just a hunch, but, Slashdot is reporting that there’s a pretty visible bug in the world clock app.  I’ve just verified it on an iPhone and an iPod Touch.  Seems that right now, it’s 5:28 PM Today where I am (it is), but it’s 12:28 on 07/12/31 in Budapest, and 04:58 on 07/12/31 in Chennai.  2031 isn’t the year of the Unix epoch rollover (2038, by the way, conveniently close to my retirement year and I plan to make out VERY well doing consulting then).  No idea where it comes up with 07/12/31.

Point is, we might be seeing 1.1.3 soon with a fix for the worldclock application.  Unless that’s mission critical for you, I’d suggest (a) redefine your mission, or (b) wait until it’s cracked.  The first thing that’ll happen when a new release comes out, is that someone will download it and see how it differs from 1.1.2 - it’ll be a listing of which files in which directories change.  Until you see that, and see something that specifically matters to you, hold off on upgrading or you could end up stuck at a rev you can’t get back from for a while.

If you’ve got a theory on where the heck 2031 comes from in this date/clock bug, I’d love to hear it.

Posted in Updates | No Comments »

iPod Touch 1.1.2 unhacked to 1.1.1 hacked guide

Monday, December 24th, 2007

So a few weeks ago, my daughter’s iPod Touch wedged, and wouldn’t let me re-install 1.1.1 - so I upgraded it to 1.1.2. Unfortunately I hadn’t run oktoprep ahead of time. So here’s a running dialog of trying to get the 1.1.2 iPod Touch back to something hackable. Basic steps will be:

1. iPod Touch at 1.1.2, unhacked

2. (magic happens)

3. 1.1.1 unhacked

4. hack 1.1.1

5. prep & upgrade to 1.1.2

6. hack 1.1.2

The goal then, is to document step two above. Let’s go.

1. Sync your iPod Touch.  This shouldn’t lose your songs & videos but why take a chance.

2. Get the firmware from Apple for:

Build 3a110a [1.1.1]

Save that somewhere you can find it in the next step.

3. Open up iTunes and connect your iPod Touch.

4. Hold the shift key and click on “update”.  You will get a dialog box asking you to find the file you just downloaded above, find and select it.

5. iTunes will reboot your iPod Touch a couple of times, at the end of the process you’ll have an iPod Touch running version 1.1.1

6. Time to jailbreak your iPod Touch.  Use Safari on the iPod to go to http://www.jailbreakme.com/ and click on the bottom button, “AppSnap installer”.  You should  get kicked out of safari, and see a “installing software, x%” message on the main screen with the spinning wheel.  If it didn’t work the first time (not unusual), go back a second time and it’ll work.  Wait until it finishes.

7. You’ll now see “installer” on your main screen.  Now you have a decision - add as many hacks as you want and stay at 1.1.1, or press on and get 1.1.2 hacked.

8. If you’re staying at 1.1.1, you’ll lose out on some of the newest hacks that are being developed just for 1.1.2.  But it’s considerably easier.  Your choice.  Either way install the “BSD Subsystem” because a lot of apps need it but don’t explicitly say so.  If you’re staying at 1.1.1, you’re done, hack away.

For 1.1.1 Hacked, to 1.1.2 Hacked, see the next post.

Posted in Updates, iPod Touch hacks | No Comments »

The ONLY benefit to 1.1.2???

Thursday, December 6th, 2007

iphone clock speed

Is what you are seeing the only real Improvement to the iPhone (maybe iPod Touch too?) with FW 1.1.2?

The CPU specs state that it can do 620 - 667 MHz, but A**le wanted to preserve more battery.

With how hot this phone gets with normal usage as it is, I can’t image the heat with 200 more MHz.

Posted in Updates, iPhone Updates, iPod Touch tricks | No Comments »

Upgrading 1.1.1 hacked to 1.1.2 (will lose mods)

Friday, November 9th, 2007

I don’t see a compelling reason to do this, but it’s good to know that you can without bricking the phone. 1.1.2 doesn’t add any killer features, and seems to only patch the .tiff vunlerability (which, if you’ve followed the normal process, is already fixed). But, as an exercise so you don’t have to, I’ve upgraded my iPhone to 1.1.2 to see how it goes.

Here’s how you get from 1.1.1 to 1.1.2 without having to go through and reinstall all your music. As usual, no guarantees, smoke & flame, backup your data, and your mods will go away, etc etc, but this worked for me:

1. (you know it’s coming) sync your data & download your pictures.

2. Not really a step but, remember, you might your voicemail and email passwords to enter after the upgrade. So get those ready. (I didn’t need them but doesn’t hurt to check)

3. Go into the installer.app and select “oktoprep” from “recent packages”. You’ll get a popup window on the iPhone/iPod touch saying “You are now ready to perform an “Update” to 1.1.2 and continue with the TouchFree process.” Now, it doesn’t tell you or me what the “TouchFree process” is, or how we are continuing with something we didn’t know we were using, but lets read on together and find out.

4. Click “Update” in iTunes. Hmmm. “This version (1.1.1) is the current version.” What’s up with that? Turns out Apple hasn’t pushed it yet but it’s on their download site: http://appldnld.apple.com.edgesuite.net/content.info.apple.com/iPhone/061-4037.20071107.5Bghn/iPhone1,1_1.1.2_3B48b_Restore.ipsw

5. Click on that URL and when your browser asks you what to do, save it to disk somewhere you can find it in step 7.

6. Wait patiently for the download to complete.

7. in iTunes, hold the shift-key while clicking on “check for updates”. It’ll open up a finder window asking you which file to use. Select the file you just downloaded (iPhone1,1_1.1.2_3B48b_Restore.ipsw) from where you just saved it to.

8. “Extracting software”

9. “Preparing iPhone for software update…”

“Waiting for iphone”

“updating iPhone software” (phone goes to silver-apple screen)

“Verifying updated iPhone software” - this step takes a couple minutes, phone screen still showing silver apple.

“Updating iPhone firmware”

“Your iPhone has been updated”

Phone reboots. My pictures are still there, because it just asked to download ‘em again to the OS.

“Waiting for activation”

“iPhone is activated”

“Slide to unlock”

OK, so, there’s the stock screen with the standard 17 icons. Pictures are there. No music but I didn’t have any music on it before so hard to say. But, I’ve shown I can get from 1.1.1 hacked to 1.1.2 without problem, in case you feel some compelling reason to move that way.

     

Posted in Updates, iPhone Updates, iPhone hacks, iPod Touch hacks | No Comments »

1.1.2

Friday, November 9th, 2007

Its out in all its unglory. It has no features at all that are worth mentioning, except it plugs the tiff exploit hole and disables all your apps again. Oh, but what’s this? Apparently, 1.1.2 was hacked before it was released.

In installer.app, check the recent packages, and you’ll find “OktoPrep.” This app will supposedly allow you to upgrade to 1.1.2 and keep everything it was at 1.1.1. Pretty fancy, but since this is so new, we would suggest holding off until its a proven method.

That being said, what does Apple need to do in order to make people update their Firmware who are reluctant because of a couple games? Right here: Flash. That is the “Killer App.”

Posted in Updates, iPhone Updates, iPhone hacks, iPhone wishlist, iPod Touch hacks, iPod Touch wishlist | No Comments »

The world is dead after 1.1.1

Sunday, October 7th, 2007

I thought I’d mention something that isn’t really noticed when it comes to the 1.1.1 update to the iPhone. The calculator icon was changed.

Before:

After:

Aren’t you glad Apple has their priorities set for their customers? You can’t add apps, you don’t have Flash, and you cannot use the carrier you want to, but hey, your calculator gets a new icon.

Posted in Updates, iPhone Updates | No Comments »

What time will the first unjail and unlocks work for 1.1.1?

Thursday, September 27th, 2007

The clock is ticking.  When will the first unjail be working for 1.1.1 ?  When will the first unlock work?  I’m guessing before midnight tonight for both, let’s see what happens.

Posted in Updates | No Comments »

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